Youth gives life to eight through organ donation

Good deed

Ten years ago two teenagers at Kollam district in Kerala were in the news after they averted a train mishap by alerting the loco pilot about a crack in the track.

On Tuesday one among them gave a fresh lease of life to eight others through organ donation.

Anujith, a 27-year-old native of Kottarakkara in Kollam district, was declared brain-dead the other day. He was under treatment at a private hospital in Thiruvananthapuram following a road accident on July 14. As per his wish, his wife and other family members decided to donate his organs.

His heart, kidneys, corneas, small intestine and hands were donated to eight patients. The heart was air-lifted for transplantation on a patient in Kochi on Tuesday.

Kerala witnessed a similar organ donation of a brain-dead person in Kochi recently. The transplants were carried out through the state government’s Kerala Network for Organ Sharing.

Health department sources said that Anujith was one of the two students who alerted a loco pilot about a crack in the rail track in 2010. On spotting the crack, they ran about 500 metres along the track and waved their red college bags to alert the loco pilot of an approaching train about the danger ahead. The loco pilot managed to stop the train and a mishap was averted.

Anujith, who was working as a driver, recently started a job as a salesman at a supermarket following lockdown. He was quite active in voluntary services. He hailed from a financially weak family. He left behind his father, a farmer, his wife who works in a jewellery shop, his mother, a three-year-old son and a sister.

Health minister K K Shailaja, who made arrangement for swift transplant procedures, hailed the family of the donor.